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EULOGIUM 



ON 



THOMAS C, BRINSMADE, M. D. 



READ BEFORE THE RENSSELAER COUNTY MEDICAL SOCIETY 



BY 



GEO. H. HUBBAKD, A. M., M. D, 



READ BEFORE THE STATE MEDICAL SOCIETY FEBRUARY 2, 1869, BY 
SPECIAL REQUEST OF THE SOCIETY. 



Qy 

ALBANY : 



WEED, PARSONS & CO., PRINTERS. 
1869. 



RlS4 

.PsH7 



238 Transactions of the 



ARTICLE XXIII. 

Eulogium on Thomas C. Brinsmade, M. D., read before the Rensselaer County Medi- 
cal Society, July 13, 1868, by Geo. H. Hubbard, A. M., M. D., President of the 
Society. (Read before the State Medical Society, Feb. 2, 1869, by special request 
of the Society.) 

" Pallida Mors mquo pulsat pedef 
Pauperum tabernas, regumque turres." 

Our every act, whether of labor or recreation, of duty or self- 
indulgence, but brings us nearer and nearer to the final act which 
shall close our earthly career, and 'tis but wise to view this inherent 
necessity of life with complaisance if not with joy. 

As we approach the end of life we come to look upon death in its 
true light as our certain and secure rest from labor and fatigue, — as 
the greatest and best event of the transitory drama called existence. 

How terrible would be our condition had our life no relief in death. 
Imagination fails to portray the evil of a life without this termination. 

We poor feeble ministers of health, whose best efforts can but 
repair the slighter ills of life, can best appreciate the rest of the 
grave — the only certain relief from pain and suffering. 

Yet, when death comes near to us and takes away one with whom 
we are intimately associated, it is but natural that we find ourselves 
mournfully regretting this necessity of life, and that those we love 
must submit to the unvarying law of nature. " 'Tis meet that we 
should mourn," and there is a sweet melancholy in speaking of the 
dead. 

Our grief for the death of our friend is rendered more tolerable by 
contemplating his long and laborious career and its beautifully appro- 
priate termination. 'Tis sweet and becoming to review the life of 
the good and great. 

We call men great whose lives have displayed acts which attract 
the public gaze, — of War or Statesmanship ; but here we have a man 
in the truest sense great, by the excellence of his life. 

Without any of the ordinary accessories of distinction, devoted to 
the laborious and unattractive details of ours called distinctively the 
silent profession, we find him by a conscientious and faithful devotion 
to that profession acquiring the love and respect of the community, 
so that on his death not only a whole city but thousands outside are 
found in mourning. 

Thomas Clark Brinsmade was born on the 16th day of June, A. D. 
1802, at New Hartford, Litchfield county, Connecticut. He was the 



New Yore State Medical Society, 239 

third son of Dr. Thomas Brinsmade, and was born in a small house 
a little north of the old church in that part of the town called " Town 
Hill." A few years since Dr. B. visited this house and found it but 
slightly changed since his childhood, — the same wall paper remain- 
ing on the bedroom, the old well with its sweep and oaken bucket. 
His friend, Dr. Benjamin H. Catlin, father of the Secretary of this 
society, writes of his early years as follows : 

" In the year 1816 a building was erected in Harwinton, my native 
town, adjoining New Hartford, for an Academy, and the first session 
of the school was held in the winter of 1816-17. It was then and 
there that I first became acquainted with Thomas C. Brinsmade, 
being fellow students. He was then reading Yirgil and was the most 
advanced student in the school, few of the others having attended 
other than a common district school. My friend at that time was 
a lad of about fourteen, was very pleasant and agreeable, and a close 
student. How long he pursued his classical studies I cannot tell, but 
he was doubtless nearly or quite fitted for college. Dr. Brinsmade 
pursued his medical studies with Dr. Peet, a distinguished physician 
at New Marlboro, Berkshire county, Massachusetts. Dr. P. was his 
uncle, being the son of his paternal grandmother by a second mar- 
riage. I was for a time successor of Dr. B. in Dr. Peet's office, and 
know the opportunities he enjoyed there. Dr. P. had an extensive 
country practice and dispensed his* own medicine. The duty of the 
student was to prepare and put up the medicine, attend to the office 
practice, and occasionally ride with the Doctor. He attended one 
course of lectures at the medical department of Yale College, and at 
its close in March, 1823, was licensed to practice by the Connecticut 
State Medical Society. At that time perhaps half of the medical 
students took licenses. In 1839 the honorary degree of M. D. was 
conferred on Dr. B. by Yale College, and in 1857 he was elected an 
honorary member by the Connecticut Medical Society. We con- 
sidered he had honored his native State, more especially the medical 
profession." 

Dr. Brinsmade came to Lansingburgh in the fall of 1823. Of his 
practice in that village little is necessary to be said. He was the 
same close student and pleasant and agreeable gentleman described 
by Dr. Catlin, and very soon secured the confidence of the community. 
In 1833, Dr. Sheldon, a leading physician of Troy, died, and Dr. 
Brinsmade was induced by the strong influences exerted by some of 
the most prominent citizens to remove here as his successor. This 
was a fortunate move for all parties ; — for Dr. B., as it gave him the 
advantage of a wider field of practice ; for this city, as it secured to 
it the best years of one of the best physicians which this country has 



240 Transactions of the 

ever produced, and for the profession, as it caused the development 
of faculties which might have remained dormant in a less favored 
locality. He practiced medicine here with an energy, industry and 
success never excelled for the period of thirty-five years, and will be 
long remembered as the beloved physician by many thousands, 
including five generations. 

Dr. Brinsmade was married on the 24th day of September, 1828, 
to Miss Elizabeth Walsh of Lansingburgh, who still survives. This 
union proved eminently happy, and many times when speaking of 
the prospect of death, he has expressed no fear of dying, but much 
feeling at the prospect of leaving his wife. Three children were the 
result of this union ; one died in infancy ; his son, Horatio "Walsh 
Brinsmade, died at the age of twenty-one, just as he had completed 
a very thorough preparation for the practice of his father's profession, 
and the only remaining child, an amiable and accomplished daughter, 
died in 1860, leaving them childless. 

The death of these children cast a shade of melancholy depression 
which remained through his life. After their death he seemed more 
devoted to his profession than ever, seeming to seek in his labors for 
the good of his race that mental solace of which the loss of his chil- 
dren had deprived him. 

From the commencement of his professional career, Dr. B. availed 
himself of the benefits of association with his professional brethren. 
He became a member of this Society in January, 1824, immediately 
after commencing practice in Lansingburgh, and in 1S4S was elected 
its President, serving two years. On retiring from this position in 
June, 1850, he gave an elaborate address on the Medical Topography 
of the city of Troy. This address is contained in the published Trans- 
actions of the State Medical Society for 1851, and is the first pub- 
lished production of his pen which I have been able to find. In 
1844 he was elected a delegate to the New York State Medical 
Society, serving four years, and a permanent member in 1850, since 
which time he has borne a prominent place in its counsels. He was 
elected Vice-President in 1857 and President in 1S58. In 1858 he 
made an address as Vice-President on the Registration of Disease, 
giving an accurate record of his practice for twenty-one years, care- 
fully analyzed and tabulated, occupying three hundred pages of the 
published Transactions and comprising statistics of 37,S72 cases. His 
address as President, delivered in 1859, is mainly devoted to the 
influence of medical men upon each other and upon the public, 
especially in an associated capacity. It is an ethical address, show- 
ing much research, and comprises twenty-six printed pages. In 1860 
he presented an "additional paper on Registration of Diseases, includ- 



New York State Medical Society. 241 

ing statistics of 2,056 cases treated in 1858 and 1859. He was elected 
a delegate to the first annual session of the American Association at 
Baltimore in 1848, and has been present at most of its sessions since 
that time, becoming identified as one of the leading members r serving 
repeatedly on the most important committees. He was elected a 
Vice-President in 1856, and also a delegate to the International 
Medical Congress, and attended its sessions at Paris in the summer 
of 1867. 

At the session of the American Medical Association at "Washing- 
ton, in May last, he presented, in behalf of the New York State 
Medical Society, the following resolutions, which were adopted : 

"Resolved, That the chairman of the delegates from this Society to 
the American Medical Association, be requested to present to said 
Association, as the desire of the Medical Society of the State of 
New York, the following resolution, and to urge its adoption: 

"Resolved, That the faculties of the several medical colleges of the 
United States be recommended to announce, explicitly, in their 
annual commencement circulars and advertisements, that they will 
not receive certificates of time of study from irregular practitioners ; 
and that they will not confer the degree upon any one who may 
acknowledge his intention to practice in accordance with any exclus- 
ive system." 

This was his last public effort to improve the standard of educa- 
tion in his profession, and as such has a peculiar interest. 

Dr. Brinsmade wrote but little, but the few papers he has pub- 
lished remain as evidences of his devotedness to his profession. 

His duties as a citizen were promptly and faithfully discharged, 
but in his own unobtrusive way and manner. The ordinary attrac- 
tions of public life were lost upon him, but to any movement tend- 
ing to make men better, physically, mentally, or morally, he gave 
his best efforts. 

I have not learned that he ever held a political office, but he served 
repeatedly as Health Officer, and Chairman of the Board of Health 
of this city. 

He early became a member of the Protestant Episcopal Church ; 
was a Vestryman of St. Paul's for many years, and on the death of 
Hon. Isaac McConihe, was elected Junior Warden, which office he 
held at the time of his death. 

He was one of the earliest patrons of the Rensselaer Polytechnic 
Institute. In the paper he was reading, in the very last moments 
of his life, he states that- all the property of the Institute was pur- 
chased by one of the committee, in 1845, for less than five hundred 
dollars. I am informed of what his characteristic modesty did not 

TAssem. No. 210.1 31 



242 Transactions of the 

allow himself to state, that he was the purchaser, and that he bor- 
rowed the money with which to purchase this property, which he 
eventually gave to the Institute. 

Of his connection with the Institute, one of the trustees writes as 
follows : " I regret to say, that owing to the burning of our records 
in the great fire of May 10, 1862, I cannot give you the date of the 
election of Dr. Brinsmade as a trustee of the Rensselaer Polytechnic 
Institute. In an address prepared by Dr. B., to be delivered to the 
graduating class, and which was read at the commencement, he stated 
that he had been a member of the board of trustees for twenty years. 

" Dr. Brinsmade has been a member of the ' prudential committee,' 
on which the larger portion of the business affairs of the Institute 
have devolved, ever since my own connection with the board, some 
fifteen years or more, and I can say that no member of the board, 
during the whole period, has contributed more generously of time 
and material aid to advance its interests. Dr. Brinsmade was not 
one who sought prominent official position, and when elected Vice- 
President of the Institute, March 20, 1865, it was an honor unsought. 
Upon the resignation of Mr. Winslow as President, there was but 
one sentiment in the board as to his successor, and at a full meeting, 
held May 7th, 1868, he was unanimously elected President. With 
such an experience, Dr. B. did not feel at liberty to decline the office, 
and at once entered upon its duties, with a renewed determination to 
secure such additional endowment as would enlarge the usefulness 
and insure the permanence and continued progress of the Institute." 

On the organization of the Marshall Infirmary, in 1851, he was 
elected one of the Governors, and was one of the visiting physicians 
from that time till his death. Always prompt in his attendance, his 
duties there entailed upon him an immense amount of gratuitous 
professional labor. 

Dr. B. was one of the original trustees of the New York State 
Inebriate Asylum, having been appointed by the act granting the 
charter, March 27, 1857, and has been elected each year from that 
time. An officer of the institution says : " He was held in high 
estimation by his fellow trustees, and his opinions and counsels 
had great weight with them. He always manifested the liveliest 
interest in the institution, and did very much toward placing it on 
its present basis." He attended the last annual meeting, June 11th, 
and took an active part in its deliberations. A letter to the super- 
intendent was amono; the last acts of his life. 

The circumstances attending his death are too well known to 
require extended notice. While attending a meeting of the citizens 
of Troy, convened to raise funds for the Rensselaer Polytechnic 



JSTew York State Medical Society, 243 

Institute, of which he was President, and while reading an import- 
ant paper, his heart suddenly ceased to beat, and he passed from time 
to eternity on the 22d day of June, A. D. 1868. 

This appropriate death was alone needed to make complete his 
earthly career. Fit ending for fit life ! 

Dr. Brinsmade had enjoyed what he always called good health. 
He had occasional attacks of illness, sometimes severe, but of no great 
duration. He was subject to sharp shooting pains of the breast, of 
a neuralgic character, to which he paid no attention but for the 
moment. Early in 1867 he was attacked with severe pain in the left 
breast which prostrated him very rapidly, and much anxiety was felt 
for his recovery. But the attack, which proved to be pneumonic, 
was short. In a few days he resumed his daily routine of visits, 
and by over-exertion brought on a relapse. This was of no great 
duration, and with greater care he rapidly recovered. His visit to 
Europe seemed to have entirely re-established his health and strength, 
and upon his return he at once engaged in practice, with an energy 
which seemed to indicate many more years of usefulness. He made 
no complaint, and we had ceased to be specially anxious about his 
health. Thus it continued, till without any preparation, came the 
chilling announcement, " Dr. Brinsmade is dead ! " On the post- 
mortem examination, the lungs showed evidence of repeated attacks 
of circumscribed inflammation, especially of the pleura, which was 
adherent at the apices, and in some places had undergone structural 
degeneration. Evidence of a recent circumscribed inflammation of 
the lung tissue, of which he had shown symptoms shortly before his 
death, were also found. Yet his lungs were better than his medical 
brethren, who knew him best, were led to expect. But if his lungs 
were better, his heart was worse. It appears that he had had for 
years, a well-grounded apprehension of heart disease, although he 
had quieted the fears of his nearest friends, and, perhaps, his own. 
The heart was considerably loaded with fat, but not to the extent 
properly called fatty degeneration. There was evidence of old 
inflammation of the left ventricle, both pericardial and endocardial, 
resulting in adhesion of the pericardium near the apex, and oppo- 
site a thickened endocardium, while between them the muscular wall 
was thinned and nearly destitute of muscular fibres. The aorta pre- 
sented many atheromatous patches, extending more than twelve 
inches from the heart. Over one of these patches the lining mem- 
brane had given way, and presented an open ulcer of about eight 
lines by six. Those of you who are familiar with the lesions recorded 
as more frequently found after death from angina pectoris, will readily 
understand why Dr. Brinsmade died, when, where and as he did. 






244 Transactions of the 

" De mortuis nil nisi bonum," 

How useless the caution ! How senseless the advice ! 

Lives there a slanderer so base, as aught to say but good of our 
deceased friend and brother ? 

His life is a poem, rivaling the proudest epic, wanting no element 
of completeness. The " good physician " is but tame, when we 
attempt to describe our loved and lost. 

We thought we knew his value while we circled round him, our 
professional mentor, but only to-day, when we meet without his 
presence, can we fully realize that our never failing professional and 
personal friend can be consulted no more. But his life died not 
with him. " 'Tis not all of life to live, nor all of death to die," and 
those of us who enjoyed his trust and friendship can never lose the 
influence of his life and labor. It will always be a lamp to our feet, 
and a strong encouragement under the most depressing occurrences 
of life. 

It is not difficult for any of us, who knew him well, to analyze the 
character of our deceased friend. He had no concealments of mat- 
ters proper to be known. We saw him as he was — the upright 
Christian gentleman. 

The basis of his character was his unswerving regard for truth. 
He was true to himself — true to his profession — true to his asso- 
ciates in every relation of life, — true to his convictions of right and 
wrong, regardless of any petty self-interest which would seem to 
come in the way. 

The next most prominent trait, was his untiring and indomitable 
industry. In this he excelled any man I ever knew. The amount 
of physical and mental labor he accomplished from day to day and 
year to year, would seem to be beyond the power of any human 
organization ; yet all was done, and well done. 

On these two prominent traits were based his excellences — reli- 
gious, moral, professional and social. Such a man could but be a 
Christian, and just such a Christian as he was ; unobtrusive, unbigoted 
with the largest charity toward all sects, and for all the weaknesses 
of poor human nature. Because to him vice was a monster, hideous, 
he did not establish himself the censor of the conduct of those whose 
mental and moral organization left them its victims. He pitied their 
weakness, and relieved their distress. Who can know the reforms 
induced by the silent, dignified example of this Christian physician, 
where a reprimand would have induced anger and resistance. 

His religious and moral character were inseparably connected. His 
religion was based on the immutable principles of truth and justice, and 
his morality on the broad basis of a Christian's duty to his fellow man. 



New York State Medical Society. 245 

Mild and undemonstrative as he always was, he sometimes mani- 
fested considerable feeling when his instinctive delicacy concerning 
religious proprieties was outraged. He especially disliked any ill- 
timed or unseemly display or attempt to make merchandise of piety, 
and did not hesitate to express this feeling ; his piety was displayed 
in acts rather than words : he preached not but practiced his pro- 
fession as one prepared at any moment to give an account. 

But it is with his professional character we are especially interested. 

He was in the fullest sense a self-made man. From slender and 
imperfect preparation he went on accumulating professional knowl- 
edge, never ceasing to be a student, outstriping many of his early 
cotemporaries possessed of much greater advantages and becoming 
one of the most truly learned physicians in available practical knowl- 
edge to be found in this or any other country. 

He practiced medicine with a singleness of purpose never excelled : 
— carefully cultivating every department of the profession ; — avoid- 
ing all tendency to special practice and yet was the trusted counsel- 
lor of those whose tastes led them to cultivate special branches. He 
would be one hour discussing Surgical Pathology and the propriety 
of an operation : — the next perhaps equally engrossed in grave ques- 
tions of Gynaecology, on each occasion the associate of men devoted 
to these specialties. In breadth of professional capacity it is safe to 
say Dr. Brinsmade had few if any superiors in the profession. 

Few men enjoyed the confidence of his brethren to an equal extent, 
and his consulting practice was in the later years of his life very large 
and eminently satisfactory and advantageous both to physician and 
patient. 

But much the largest share of his consultations were those con- 
tinually recurring cases where we consulted him privately at his own 
office as a son would consult a father. We instinctively turned to 
his great learning and long experience to verify or correct our 
opinions and practice. His kind and generous interest encouraged 
us to go to him with our hopes, fears and anxieties, never fearing to 
betray our ignorance and never failing to get his best advice freely 
and without fee or reward. The amount of time spent in these 
unpaid consultations was very large, but its full extent can never be 
known. We, each of us, know how much he did for us and for our 
patients, but he only knew the aggregate. He never boasted nor 
seemed to regard it as more than justly due from him to his brethren. 

As would be justly expected he was especially tenacious of the 
honor and dignity of the profession. Impostors and pretenders of all 
sorts he always stoutly denounced, utterly refusing consultations or 
professional intercourse; — but he was careful that no inhumanity 



246 Transactions of the 

should come of his refusal, and often rendered aid in critical cases 
which had been under the care of incompetent practitioners when 
less humane men would have refused assistance, but in no case have 
I known him to meet or recognize an irregular practitioner knowing 
him to be such. 

His services were freely rendered to rich and poor alike. While 
he enjoyed the patronage of the intelligent and wealthy, he equally 
enjoyed the patronage of a greater share of the poor and lowly : — ■ 
they received his care without limit : — like Sydenham, he considered 
them " his best patients, as God was their paymaster." 

The teachings of this life must be plain to the most obtuse intellect, 
— labor conquers all obstacles, and truth leads to success. 

It may be said that Dr. Brinsmade was peculiarly fortunate in the 
many circumstances which rendered his life so preeminently success- 
ful : — but were not these circumstances one and all earned by his 
own labor and truth ? — would any one of the seemingly fortunate 
accidents of his life have happened to him had he been indolent or 
vicious ? 

Much of his professional success came through the confidence of 
his professional brethren : — this confidence was the natural con- 
sequent to his large acquirements and acknowledged excellence in 
his profession as well as his unswerving faithfulness in all his rela- 
tions to his associates. 

Next to this was the personal esteem in which he was held by all 
classes and conditions of men. The thousands outside of his personal 
acquaintance who knew him only by his public acts properly appre- 
ciated and valued the excellence of his character. 



EULOGIUM 



THOMAS C. BRINSMADE, M. D. 



EFOKE HI IV MEDICAL 



BY 



GEO. II. HUBBARD, A. M., M. D. 



READ BEFORE TIN I MEDK 



BY 



ALBANY: 
WEED, P ARSNNS & CO., PRINTERS. 



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